Last weekend, One Way Street’s Denver Puppet Ministry Festival celebrated it’s 30th anniversary. We had a great group of teams from all over the Rocky Mountain Region, plus several friends from other parts of the country who came to show their appreciation.

Here is a video that was shown at the festival featuring clips from several of the early years of the Denver festival. You’ll probably see some familiar faces, though looking quite a bit younger than you may be used to.

We also shared several video messages from some friends of One Way Street. Jim Wideman was a part of many of the early Denver festivals, here he is with his daughter Yancy…

Andy Irvin was one of One Way Street’s earliest ministry interns. Here is his greeting…

Finally we have greetings from Jim & Bonnie Scott and Nancy Bellinger of the Celebration Puppeteers in Indianapolis. They sent a video greeting, but surprised us by showing up in person as well…

Not all I-Fest hands-on classes are building classes. Some take you in-depth with a certain skill and give you time to practice…like this juggling class with Darren Collins.

Throwing Up Gracefully – Darren Collins

Class size Limit: 30

If you have ever wanted to learn to juggle, this is the place for you. Learn to throw three balls up, and catch them all gracefully in this fully hands-on and encouraging class! Quick 4 ball and 5 ball lessons will be included, along with routines for sharing your faith, and biblical lessons through juggling. Darren Collins has taught thousands of people to juggle all over the world, and claims that no less than 75% of his attendees will be juggling before the end of the class period! Give it a try!

I was trying to think about how to wrap up this series of “Ministry for Kids by Kids” articles. We’ve talked about several different art forms that kids can use to express their creativity and, more importantly, minister to their peers. We’ve covered puppets, storytelling, videos, and others…so how to finish? We haven’t even touched on things like drama, gospel illusions, music…even sports! But the thought occurred to me, the possibilities really are endless. As a children’s ministry leader, you may have certain things you know you want to incorporate in your ministry, so you set out to train young people in those areas. But God may surprise you and bring you a child who has an interest in something you would’ve never dreamed of, not to mention a desire to use that interest in ministry. What an awesome opportunity.

Unfortunately, what is the automatic response that pops into our minds in these situations…”Oh, great…one more program I don’t have the time to run.” If a child comes to you and says, “I learned how to juggle in my school gym class and I love it! I feel like I’m supposed to tell people about Jesus with juggling” do you say, “Sorry, but our curriculum does not include juggling.” Oh, I hope not. If God has given you a juggler, I’d recommend finding a way to use a juggler in children’s church.

Ask God to show you the things that will get your kids fired up about ministry. Maybe it means starting a ministry team of some sort, like a puppet team, drama team, or kids worship team. Maybe it means asking God to show you the gifts and talents he’s given the kids in your church. Let those kids have a chance to do more than just pass out snacks and see what amazing ministry happens!

Here’s another hands-on class that will be offered at I-Fest 2010. Get your registration in so you can start signing up for these classes. And remember, the Dream Team deadline is this Friday…April 30!

His Heart – June Privett

June will teach you how to build a quality foam-based heart puppet using high quality foam. This puppet is durable enough for everyday use and has all the colors of the “wordless book” object lesson. In this class you will learn how to correctly cut foam patterns, correctly and precisely glue foam together, and finish a puppet mouth cleanly and professionally. Please bring: an x-acto knife, sharp scissors, hot glue gun, and a black marking pen.

Just a quick reminder that your Dream Team applications are due in to One Way Street this Friday, April 30. That’s for Ventriloquist Dream Team, Puppetry Dream Team and Puppetry Dream Team Assistant applications.

This weekend is the 30th annual Denver Puppet Ministry Festival! We’re letting you in on the fun by having a special weekend sale on 30 items…some at up to 30% savings. The sale goes through Monday April 26, 2010. Click on the link to save!

In college my major was radio and video production. Yep, sorry to disappoint, but I do not have a degree in puppetry. I’m old enough that I was right at the tail end of the “old fashioned way” of doing things in media. Believe it or not, I actually learned how to cut and splice audio tape. It’s been almost 20 years since I darkened the halls of education, and slowly over that time technology has come into existence that allows anyone with a computer to do the things I learned how to do in college, and do them much better.

I’ve noticed that kids are fascinated by cameras. They love being filmed and they love doing the filming. It only makes sense that creating videos that can be used in a children’s church lesson would be another great opportunity for kids to be active in ministry. Now we’re not talking high tech production values here. Mr. Spielberg need not be worried. But even the simplest video production can really draw people in. Let me show you what I mean. Here is a short video created by my friend Karl Bastian (The Kidologist). He has created many of these videos he calls Toybox Tales (www.toyboxtales.com) where he uses action figures to act out a story. This one is a lighthearted look at a day in the life of a children’s pastor.

Now that video was made by an adult, but it reminds me of the way I see my kids play with their toys. What amazing results would we see if we set up a video camera and allowed kids the chance to make videos of Bible stories acted out with toys. But why stop there? Other materials could be used instead of toys. My son has recently gotten into baseball cards (I turned my old collection over to him), what if baseball cards were used to act out the story. A few years ago, the channel Nickelodeon had a whole series of short fillers they would show where the character was a popsicle stick with a face drawn on it, kids could use characters like that to make a video. One of the things I love about this technique is that it involves elements of puppetry, drama, storytelling, and even scriptwriting, and wraps it all up together in a newer technology.

I do have two big recommendations if you are going to try making your own videos. First…please use a tripod. Lock that camera down! If the kids are doing hand-held cinematography your going to need to have sick bags on hand in children’s church. It’ll be harder to watch than the Bourne movies. Second would be to make sure you use some sort of editing software. It won’t be perfect in one take, so plan on being able to cut the bloopers. Great editing software can be found for only about $50 or so nowdays!

Way back when we started this series we talked about how involving kids in ministry teaches them new skills. Imagine if a bunch of young believers were given the chance to make short videos for children’s church. Now imagine those kids continue to learn more about video production as they get older. Now imagine what might happen if a new generation of young Christian filmmakers started making an impact on Hollywood. Got your video camera out yet?

I ran across this video today from Roger Fields. Roger is a great children’s ministry leader and the brains behind Kidz Blitz. In this video, Roger tells a brief story about a time when God reminded him that it only takes a brief moment to change someone’s life. But what I was struck by was the point at which he talks about how the woman’s 10-year old son accepted Christ as a Kidz Blitz event, and has been serving God ever since. That’s exactly what we’ve been talking about in these “for kids by kids” articles! This young man has been actively minitering to others from age 10-18 and I have a feeling it will keep going from there. How awesome is that!